20 years for railway contract bribes
Print Edition
A 59-YEAR-OLD businesswoman involved in the downfall of former railways minister Liu Zhijun was sentenced to 20 years in prison by a Beijing court yesterday on charges of bribery and illegal business operations.
Ding Yuxin, also known as Ding Shumiao, was also fined 2.5 billion yuan (US$404 million) and had 20 million yuan worth of personal property confiscated, the Beijing No. 2 Intermediate People’s Court announced.
The fine is believed to be the largest imposed on an individual in China.
The court found that Ding, former legal representative of the Beijing Broad Union Investment Management Company, had helped 23 contractors win bids for 57 railway projects between 2007 and 2010.
Illegal commission fees amounted to more than 3 billion yuan and Ding herself gained more than 2 billion.
The railway construction bidding market had been seriously disrupted by Ding’s illegal activities, the court said.
At her trial in September last year, prosecutors said Ding and her relatives had reaped huge profits from a number of projects and cargo transport contracts as well as the acquisition of shares and enterprise financing with Liu’s help between 2004 and 2011. In return, she paid him bribes worth 49 million yuan.
In June last year, Liu was charged with helping Ding make profits of almost 4 billion yuan, and a month later he was sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve for taking bribes of more than 64 million yuan.
At her trial, Ding said: “I got along with Liu for 10 years. Liu had helped me to earn a big fortune. I took every effort to accomplish tasks that he told me to do. I didn’t care how much I spent on him.”
Business website caixin.com reported that the former railway ministry in an internal statement had accused Liu of “having degenerate morals” and “philandering with several women.” It said that Ding had sent three women to Liu and he also received bribes from four other officials and kept many valuables, including calligraphy works and paintings.
The court also said yesterday that Ding had paid 40 million yuan in bribes to Fan Zengyu, a former official with the poverty-relief office under the State Council between June 2009 and September 2010 in a bid to polish her “charity image.”
Fan was taken to court in January and a verdict is awaited.
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